German Prosecutors Warn That Hamas Sleeper Cells, Hobbled at Gaza, Are Turning Their Attention to Europe

German prosecutors have brought charges against four men who are suspected of being operators for Hamas’s underground depots that the terrorist group operates in Europe to attack Jewish targets. Germany’s Office of the Federal Public Prosecutor announced on Monday that it had filed charges against the four men — including one Egyptian, one Dutch national, and two Lebanese nationals. The men are “strongly suspected of membership in a foreign terrorist organization,” authorities said. Although the militant Islamist organization’s leadership is based in the Gaza strip, the group has readied underground weapons caches across Europe, prosecutors said.“Some time ago, HAMAS set up underground weapons depots in various European countries in order to keep them ready for possible attacks against Jewish institutions in Europe,” the statement said, noting that Hamas uses “so-called foreign operators” — usually people with European residence permits — to operate the depots.“In connection with the preparations for the terrorist attack on October 7, 2023, the organization was keen to make deposited weapons available again,” it read.According to the German prosecutors, the four suspects — Abdelhamid Al A., Mohamed B., Nazih R. and Ibrahim El-R. — had been tied to Hamas for years, working as foreign operators. They all had high-profile positions in Hamas and “ direct ties to senior management of the military wing.”“The prosecution of Hamas members who’ve plotted terrorist attacks in Europe highlights that the Islamist group poses a threat beyond Israel’s borders,” a senior research analyst at the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies, Joe Truzman, said in a statement. “These prosecutions and other acts by Hamas underscore the need to recognize the broader implications of the group’s activities and the dangers they pose to global security.”One of the Lebanese suspects, Ibrahim El-R, set up weapons depots in Bulgaria and brought at least one weapon to Germany from a Hamas weapons cache in Denmark, prosecutors said, noting that he traveled to Bulgaria again in 2023 to “inspect the depot.” The accused men were arrested in the Netherlands in December 2023, the statement noted, and they were transferred to Germany for prosecution earlier this year.

German Prosecutors Warn That Hamas Sleeper Cells, Hobbled at Gaza, Are Turning Their Attention to Europe

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